Light O' the Morning: The Story of an Irish Girl Part 48

"You will bring them in--the potatoes, I mean--in their jackets," said the Irish girl, "and have them hot as hot can be."

"They shall screech, that they shall," replied Hannah; "and the bacon, it shall be done as tasty and sweet as bacon can be. I'll give the last bit of my own little pigeen, with all the heart in the world, for the Squire's supper."

Accordingly, when the long cart arrived from Cronane, accompanied by the Squire and his factotum, Mike, the barn was ready to receive the bedstead, the straw pailla.s.se, and the mattress. Nora managed to convey, from the depths of the Castle, sheets, blankets, pillows, and a counterpane, and everything was in apple-pie order by the time the family was supposed to a.s.semble for afternoon tea. This was the hour that Nora had selected for having the Squire removed from his feather-bed existence to the more breezy life of the barn. It was now the fas.h.i.+on at O'Shanaghgan to make quite a state occasion of afternoon tea. The servants, in their grand livery, were all well to the fore.

Mrs. O'Shanaghgan, dressed as became the lady of so beautiful a place, sat in her lovely drawing room to receive her guests; and the guests came up in many conveyances--some in carriages, some on outside cars, some on dog-carts, some on foot; but, come as they would, they came, day after day, to show their respects to the lady whom now the whole country delighted to honor.

On these occasions Mr. Hartrick sat with his sister, and helped her to entertain her visitors. It had been one of the sore points between Nora and her mother that the former would not appear to afternoon tea. Nora had made her sick father her excuse. On the present occasion she took good care not even to show her face inside the house. But Molly kept watch, just behind the plantation, and soon rushed into the yard to say that the carriages were beginning to appear.

"A curious party have come just now," said Molly, "in such a droll carriage, with yellow wheels and a gla.s.s body. It looks like a sort of a Lord Mayor's coach."

"Why, it must be the coach of the O'Rorkes," cried Nora. "Fancy Madam coming to see mother! Why, Madam will scarcely pay a visit to royalty itself. There is no doubt that mother is thought a lot of now. Oh, dear, oh, dear, what a frightfully society life we shall have to lead here in future! But I have no time to think of mother and her friends just now.

Squire, will you come upstairs with me to see father? Hannah, please wait down here to be ready to help? Angus, you must also come upstairs, and wait in the pa.s.sage outside the Squire's room until I send for you."

Having given her directions, Nora entered the house. All was quiet and peaceful. The well trained English servants were, some of them, in the kitchen premises, and some of them attending in the hall and drawing rooms, where the guests were now arriving thick and fast. Nora had chosen her hour well. She entered her father's room, accompanied by Squire Murphy.

The old Squire was lying, half-dozing, in his luxurious bed. The fire had been recently built up. The room felt close.

"Ah, dear!" said Squire Murphy, "it is difficult to breathe here! And how's yourself, O'Shanaghgan, my man? Why, you do look drawn and pulled down. I am right glad to see ye, that I am."

The Squire of Cronane grasped the hand of the Squire of O'Shanaghgan, and the Squire of O'Shanaghgan looked up at the other man's weather-beaten face with a pathetic expression in his deep-set, hawk-like, dark eyes.

"I am bad, Murphy--very bad," said the Squire; "it's killing me they are amongst them."

"Why, then, it looks like it," said Squire Murphy. "I never was in such a smotheration of a place before. Faix, then, why don't you have the window open, and have a bit of air circulating through the room?"

"It's forbid I am," said the Squire. "Ah, Murphy! it's killing me, it's killing me."

"But it shall kill you no longer, father," said Nora. "Oh, father!

Squire Murphy and I have made up such a lovely, delicious plan. What would you say to a big, bare room again, father; and a hard bed again, father; and potatoes and a pinch of salt and a little bit of bacon again, father?"

"What would I say?" cried the Squire. "I'd say, glory be to Heaven, and all the Saints be praised; but it is too good luck to be true."

"Not a bit of it," said Squire Murphy; "it is going to be true. You just do what you are bid, and you will be in the hoight of contentment."

The wonder-stricken Squire now had to listen to Nora's plan.

"We have done it," she cried, in conclusion; "the barn is ready. It makes a lovely bedroom; there are no end of draughts, and you'll get well in a jiffy."

"Then let's be quick," said the Squire, "or your lady-mother will be up and prevent me. Hurry, Nora, for Heaven's sake! For the life of me, don't give me a cup of cold water to taste, and then dash it from my lips. If we are not quick, we'll be caught and prevented from going. I am ready; wrap me up in a rug, and carry me out. I am ready and willing.

Good-by to feather bed-dom. I don't want ever to see these fal-lals again."

The next few moments were ones of intense excitement; but before ten minutes had elapsed the Squire was lying in the middle of the hard bed, gazing round him with twinkling eyes and a smile on his lips. The appearance of Hannah Croneen, with a dish of steaming potatoes and a piece of boiled bacon, was the final crown to his rapture.

CHAPTER x.x.xII.

ANDY.

Are there any words in the language to describe the scene which took place at O'Shanaghgan when Mrs. O'Shanaghgan discovered what Nora had done? She called her brother to her aid; and, visiting the barn in her own august person, her company dress held neatly up so as to display her trim ankles and pretty shoes, solemnly announced that her daughter Nora was guilty of the murder of her own father, and that she, Mrs.

O'Shanaghgan, washed her hands of her in the future.

"Yes, Nora," said the irate lady, "you can go your own way from this time. I have done all that a mother could do for you; but your wildness and insubordination are past bearing. This last and final act crowns all. The servants shall come into the barn, and bring your poor father back to his bedroom, and you shall see nothing of him again until the doctor gives leave. Pray, George," continued Mrs. O'Shanaghgan, "send one of the grooms at once for Doctor Talbot. I doubt if my poor husband has a chance of recovery after this mad deed; but we must take what steps we can."

"Now, look here, Ellen," said the Squire; "if you can't be aisy, be as aisy as you can. There's no sort of use in your putting on these high-falutin airs. I was born an Irishman. I opened my eyes on this world in a good, sharp draught, and, if I am to die, it's in a draught I'll leave the world; but, once for all, no more smotherations for me.

I've had too much of 'em. You say this child is likely to be the death of me. Why, then, Ellen--G.o.d forgive yer ignorance, my poor wife--but it's the life of me she'll be, not the death. Isn't it in comfort I'm lying for the first time since that spalpeen behind the hedge tried to fell me to the earth? Isn't it a good meal I've just had?--potatoes in their jackets, and a taste of fat bacon; and if I can wash it down, as I mean to later on, with a drop of mountain-dew, why, it's well I'll slumber to-night. You're a very fine woman, me lady, and I'm proud as Punch of you, but you don't know how to manage a wild Irishman when he is ill. Now, Nora, bless her pretty heart, saw right through and through me--the way I was being killed by inches; the hot room and the horrid carpets and curtains; and the fire, not even made of decent turf, but those ugly black coals, and never a draught through the chamber, except when I took it unbeknownst to you. Ah, Nora guessed that her father was dying, and there was no way of saving him but doing it on the sly. Well, I'm here, the girleen has managed it, and here I'll stay. Not all the doctors in the land, nor all the fine English grooms, shall take me back again. I'll walk back when I'm fit to walk, and I'll do my best to bear all that awful furniture; but in future this is my bedroom, and now you know the worst."

The Squire had a great color in his face as he spoke; his eyes were s.h.i.+ning as they had not shone since his accident, and his voice was quite strong. Squire Murphy, who was standing near, clapped him on the shoulder.

"Why, Patrick," he said, "it's proud of you I am; you're like your old self again--blest if you're not."

Nora, who was kneeling by her father's bed, kept her face slightly turned away from her mother; the tears were in her eyes, but there was a well of thanksgiving in her heart. In spite of her mother's angry reproaches, she knew she had done the right thing. Her father would get well now. After all, his Irish daughter knew what he wanted, and she must bear her English mother's anger.

In an incredibly short s.p.a.ce of time two or three of the men-servants appeared, accompanied by Dr. Talbot. They stood in the entrance to the barn, prepared to carry out orders; but now there stole past them the Irish groom, Angus, and Hannah Croneen. These two came and stood near Nora at the head of the bed. Dr. Talbot examined the patient, looked round the cheerless barn, and said, with a smile, glancing from Mrs.

O'Shanaghgan to O'Shanaghgan's own face:

"This will never do; you must get back to your own comfortable room, my dear sir--that is, if I am to continue to attend you."

"Then, for G.o.d's sake, leave off attending me, Talbot," said the Squire.

"You must be a rare ignoramus not to see that your treatment is killing me out and out. It's fresh air I want, and plenty of it, and no more fal-lals. Is it in my grave you'd have me in a fortnight's time? You get out of this, and leave me to Mother Nature and the nursing of my Irish colleen."

This was the final straw. Mrs. O'Shanaghgan left the barn, looking more erect and more stately even than when she had entered it. Mr. Hartrick followed her, so did the enraged Dr. Talbot, and lastly the English servants. Squire Murphy uttered the one word, "Routed!" and clapped his hand on his thigh.

The Squire, however, spoke sadly.

"I am sorry to vex your lady mother, Nora," he said; "and upon my soul, child, you must get me well as quick as possible. We must prove to her that we are in the right--that we must."

"Have a dhrop of the crayther, your honor," said Hannah, now coming forward. "It's truth I'm telling, but this is me very last bottle of potheen, which I was keeping for me funeral; but there, his honor's wilcome to every drain of it."

"Pour me out a little," said the Squire.

He drank off the spirit, which was absolutely pure and unadulterated, and smacked his lips.

"It's fine I'll be to-night," he said; "it's you that have the 'cute ways, Nora. You have saved me. But, indeed, I thank you all, my friends, for coming to my deliverance."

That night, in her smoke-begrimed cabin, Hannah Croneen described with much unction the way madam and the English doctor had been made to know their place, as she expressed it.

"'Twas himself that put them down," said Hannah. "Ah, but he is a grand man, is O'Shanaghgan."

Mrs. O'Shanaghgan spent a very unhappy night. No comfort could she derive even from Mr. Hartrick's words. Nora was an out-and-out rebel, and must be treated accordingly; and as to the Squire--well, when Nora attended his funeral her eyes might be opened. The good lady was quite certain that the Squire would have developed pneumonia by the morning; but when the reports reached her that he looked heartier and better than he had since his illness, she could scarcely believe her ears. This, however, was a fact, for Mother Nature did step in to cure the Squire; and the draughty barn, with its lack of every ordinary comfort, was so soothing to his soul that it began to have an equally good effect upon his body.

Notwithstanding that it poured rain outside, and that great eddies of wind came from under the badly-fitting doors and in at the cracks of the small windows, the Squire ate his food with appet.i.te, and began once again to enjoy life. In the first place, he was no longer lonely. It was impossible for his old friends and retainers to visit him in the solitude of his grand bedroom; but it was perfectly easy, not only for Squire Murphy and Squire Fitzgerald, and half the other squireens of the neighborhood, to slip into the barn and have a "collogue," as they expressed it; but also the little gossoons in their ragged trousers and bare feet, and the girleens, with their curly hair, and roguish dark-blue eyes, to scuttle in also. For could they not dart under the bed like so many rabbits if madam's step was heard, and didn't the Squire, bless him! like to have them with him when madam was busy with her English friends? Then Nora herself, the darling of his heart, was scarcely ever away from him now. Didn't she sit perched like a bird on the foot of the hard bed and cause him to roar with laughter as she described the English and their ways? Molly, too, became a prime favorite with the Squire. It is sad to relate that he encouraged her in her naughty words, and she began to say "Jehoshaphat!" and "Elephants!"

and "Holy Moses!" more frequently than ever.

The grand fact of all, however, was this: the Squire was getting well again.